


For whom the bell trolls

by brothebro



Series: Witcher!Jaskier fics [3]
Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Apologies, Excessive Swearing, Gen, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia Apologizes, Hijinks & Shenanigans, No Post-Mountain Geralt Vilification, Secret Identity, Swearing, Witcher Jaskier | Dandelion, glamours, jaskier is a bit too mean in this sorry, no beta we die like Geralt's poor mind, post mountain
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-14
Updated: 2020-05-14
Packaged: 2021-03-02 16:54:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24180160
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brothebro/pseuds/brothebro
Summary: For the amazing @starsInMyDamnEyes :Dthe prompt they sent me was this:For the witcher!Jaskier prompts: After the mountain, Jaskier decides to go back to witcher-ing as his notoriety as Geralt's bard begins to grate on him. At one point, he is invited by a non-Geralt to spend the winter at Kaer Morhen, and he agrees, mainly to majorly fuck with Geralt's head. The witcher bard can have a little revenge, as a treat :)
Series: Witcher!Jaskier fics [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1735504
Comments: 30
Kudos: 542





	For whom the bell trolls

**Author's Note:**

  * For [StarsInMyDamnEyes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarsInMyDamnEyes/gifts).



> Jaskier is a bit mean in this one I'm sorry 
> 
> Still, hope you enjoy it!  
> And if you did feel free to leave me a comment :D

It’s been two weeks since that fucking mountain. Two fucking weeks Jaskier waited on the village at the foot of the mountain for Geralt to apologize for being a massive arse. Yet, the fucking whoreson never showed. 

Jaskier is livid. He would have forgiven Geralt if he came to seek him, to say a simple ‘sorry Jaskier’ or ‘I was mad Jaskier, I didn’t mean it Jaskier’. But the man he called his best friend in the whole fucking world, who travelled with him for two bloody decades, blamed poor innocent Jaskier for all of his problems and told him to promptly fuck off. 

The fucking bastard wolf.

Jaskier packs his meagre belongings and walks away. He doesn’t know where he will go; he aims to wander for a while. Maybe, sing a bit here and there, travelling from one backwater town to another. You know, make some coin for some new fancy silks, as you do. 

So he does just that. He travels. 

Alas, it might be his terrible luck, or it might be that he apparently fucking built his whole fucking career on songs about the White Wolf but he cannot escape the bitch of a witcher. Wherever he goes he’s being welcomed with cheers and applause and the obligatory ‘OH! THE WHITE WOLF’S BARD IS HERE!’. 

Fucking hell.

Maybe it’s time, he contemplates, to go back to being a Witcher. Get rid of all the finery and silks, exchange them for a new set of armour. Buy some nice swords. Or have them made. Throw the fucking earing with the glamour away. Maybe even stage Jaskier’s death and resurrect Julian of Kovir.

A plan forms in his mind, but the moment he glances at his elven lute it quickly dissipates from his mind. Until of course, he reaches yet another town and goes through yet another round of exalting the bloody White Wolf’s feats.

It’s in one particularly stinky decrepit and all in all unpleasant little hovel in lower Redania, near the banks of the river Buina, that he finally fucking snaps. 

He’s performing in the local tavern --an unusually rancid establishment-- and those bastard villagers won’t even try to refer to him by name or even respect that  _ no he does not want to fucking play Toss a fucking coin for the tenth consecutive time. _

Somehow, he ends up initiating a tavern brawl that would make his friend Coën, from back when they were still training together in Kaer Seren, proud. 

Of course, as any good tavern brawl that respects itself should be, Jaskier ends up thrown in the muddy street, beaten and penniless. Somebody must have snagged his coin pouch from him when he was busy beating the toss-a-coin-lovers black and blue. 

_ Fucking brilliant.  _

There’s no point going inside the tavern to get his fucking money back. After all, he isn’t really in the business of murdering villagers, however annoying they might be. 

So he packs his lute in its case, slings it on his back and sets off to pass the fucking Buina river. In the middle of the fucking night. Yep. That’s what he’s gonna do.

He’s had enough of being Geralt’s barker. He’s had enough and he’s ready for it all to end. Fucking Geralt. Fucking arsehole. Fucking everything!

In a fit of rage, when there are no more pebbles in his way he can kick, he tears the enchanted earing off his ear --fuck it hurts-- and throws it into the river. 

He stomps fiercely towards the big stone bridge that connects Kovir with Redania, not giving a flying fuck if someone saw his little stun-- if someone witnessed the bard turn back into a rugged Witcher. He’s absolutely enraged, he’s digging his nails deep into the soft --not so soft anymore-- skin of his palms. He doesn’t even notice the large stony creature that emerges from below the bridge until a huge hand closes his way to the other side. 

“Troll toll,” a deep gravelly voice demands. 

_ Bloody brilliant _ . A troll. Exactly what was missing from this wonderful day. 

_ A fucking troll. _

“Let me fucking through shit-for-brains!” he hisses looking the creature in the eye. 

“Toll or bad man go boom,” the troll says calmly. 

“I have no fucking money you bloody idiot, can’t you see?” he gestures to his pitiful self. 

“Toll or go boom,” the troll warns again. 

_ Ugh.  _ How inconvenient. Jaskier doesn’t even have a dagger with him to bribe or attempt to kill the troll with. He sighs deeply, trying to calm his nerves lest he wants to accidentally do something absolutely buffoonish that lands him as troll fodder. 

“I can’t pay you sir troll,” he says, rubbing calming circles on his temples. “Good luck with the next traveller, I’ll just swim across.”

He turns to leave and comes face to face with a heavily scarred, heavily armed individual. The light is low but he can distinguish the cat-like eyes of the man clearly. 

Another Witcher. Brilliant. 

“Tough night?” the Witcher asks and places a hand on Jaskier’s shoulder sympathetically. Jaskier blinks a couple of times, stunned but doesn’t answer. Then the Witcher turns to the troll, “How much, for the both of us?”

Has Jaskier heard correctly? An unknown Witcher, a Witcher he’s positive he’s never met before, is offering to pay his toll for him? He forms a silent ‘why’ with his mouth and looks at the man quizzically. 

The troll is counting on his big fingers before he answers, “Eight... good Witchy.” 

“Very well,” the Witcher says and deposits the meagre amount of coins on the troll’s big hands. The witcher turns and smiles at Jaskier.  _ Smiles _ ! And it’s genuine as well! “Come on,” the man says.

Jaskier stays rooted in place. Did that just happen, or do his eyes deceive him? 

“Why?” he finally asks. “Why would you help me? You don’t know me!” 

“Why not?” the Witcher shrugs, “Let’s go get us some proper ale at Brnov. You look like you've had a rough day. I’m Eskel, by the way,” he extends a hand to Jaskier.

“Jaskier-  _ fuck- no _ \- Julian is my name,” he corrects himself and shakes Eskel’s hand reluctantly and they start traversing the bridge. 

Recognition shines in Eskel’s golden eyes.  _ Oh no… _

“Wait. You’re Geralt’s bard? Funny, I never thought you’d be a Witcher.” Eskel asks, eyes wide and Jaskier sighs feeling the beginnings of a headache forming.  _ Of fucking course, Eskel knows the bastard, Geralt.  _

“I’m not Geralt’s anything at this point. And he doesn’t know I’m a Witcher, so let’s keep it at that shall we?” he whispers the last part, even though he is aware the other man can hear him perfectly clear. 

Eskel shakes his head and sighs, “What did my idiot brother do? Something incredibly stupid, if I can judge correctly from the scowl plastered on your face.”

Jaskier snorts a mocking laugh. “Do you really want to know?”

Eskel nods sincerely, “Only if you want to tell me. I won’t pressure you.”

-

Jaskier tells Eskel everything, every single thing that happened at that blasted mountain till he found him at the bridge, minutes after he tossed his very expensive glamour into Buina’s watery oblivion. All that and much more he shares over what probably is a whole barrel of good Redanian ale. Piss drunk by the end of it, incoherently babbling, or more accurately adorning the White Wolf with all sorts of profanities in an incomprehensible manner. 

Eskel is a delightful company, Jaskier finds out. The wolf witcher is well mannered, he lets him vent as much as he likes never complaining one bit and most importantly he answers in fully formed sentences. And he’s also genuinely interested in learning music! 

Hell, the man even offers to come with him to Oxenfurt, so Jaskier can retrieve his stashed savings and get himself a proper armour that is not Eskel’s spare pieces (that are absolutely too big on him). 

They travel together for some months, taking whichever contract falls on their hands, splitting the reward. While not monetarily efficient, it’s fun to walk the Path with a friend. 

Jaskier never expected the return to his old life to go like this, in fact, he always pictured Coën to be the one to drag him back if they ever crossed paths. But it’s fine. Living like this. Sure, he doesn’t like the scrutinizing looks the good people of the Continent give him when they cross paths but he’d take that any day over having to sing praises on Geralt’s name.

Eventually, winter starts creeping upon them, the contracts getting sparser and far in between. It’s time to find a place to hole up before the snows come. Jaskier contemplates on going to Oxenfurt to crash at his tiny apartment (which he acquired during his illustrious bardic career as a fucking barker of all things) but Oxenfurt is too far away from where he and Eskel currently are; namely Kaedwen. There is approximately zero chance of getting to the Redanian city without getting snowed in at the Mahakam pass and the way around is too much of a hassle to even try following.

He could, theoretically, try reaching Kaer Seren in Kovir but he has no idea if the Griffin Keep is remotely functional. He heard a few years ago that an avalanche, of all things, destroyed it. 

Oh well, he might be lucky and find an abandoned barn or something. Or he could pay some hopefully kind villager to use their stable. Anyway, there are choices. 

He’s deep in thought, poking with his sword at the campfire when Eskel’s rough voice brings him back to reality. 

“Julian,” Eskel says. 

“Eskel.”

“I said, will you come to Kaer Morhen with me? For the winter.” 

Oh.  _ Oh!  _ He did not realise this was even a choice. But it makes sense. Kaer Morhen is not even a week away from where they are. 

But… The bastard, Geralt, might be there too. He frowns, weighing his options.

Warm keep versus cold barn. Proper food versus hunting for rabbits. Company of Witchers versus loneliness. Tough choice.

Suddenly an idea crosses his mind. 

_ Oh, this is brilliant! _

“Julian?” Eskel asks worriedly. 

“I will come with you,” Jaskier says and smirks.

“Oh no, I don’t like that smirk. What are you planning Jules?” Eskel’s brows knit together in concern.

“Oh don’t look at me like that, I only plan to torment Geralt a bit.  _ If _ he shows, that is.”

"He will show. He always shows." Eskel says smiling brightly.

"Good. Now listen to what we’re going to do."

“We?”

“We.”

-

  
  


Kaer Morhen looks unsurprisingly, a lot like Kaer Seren. It’s a castle alright, with stones and towers and walls and shit. It might not be the castle Jaskier grew up in but it still manages to bring back terrible terrible childhood memories. And some few good ones. But mostly terrible. 

Jaskier had the time during the trek to the keep to concoct the perfect little plan to mess with the bastard's, _ Geralt’s _ , head. It will be the performance of a lifetime, that is if Eskel can do his part well.  _ Melitele help him. _ The man has the acting skills of a puppy.

A little before they reach the large portcullis of the outer wall Jaskier hands his lute case to Eskel. After all, for his plan to succeed he mustn’t be seen with it. But the lute itself should make a grand appearance. 

“Open the door Vesemir,” Eskel shouts and a few minutes later the heavy clanging of the mechanism can be heard and painfully slowly the door ascents revealing the stoic face of the bastard, Geralt.

“Geralt what the fuck you whoreson! I can’t keep the fucking door open by myself!” A stranger’s voice --probably that Lambert chap Eskel told him about if the excessive swearing is any indication-- can be heard from somewhere behind the wall. 

Geralt, the fucker, just grunts and crosses his arms boring his witchery eyes right into Jaskier’s. Jaskier settles for a confused but polite smile. And so the act has begun.

“Geralt I know you’re trying to be cool but come on man, the portcullis cannot fucking lift itself,” the man yells a bit louder and lets the door waver and fall down a smidge. Geralt grunts annoyed and leaves to help. 

Once the door’s open enough Eskel and he pass through entering the vast empty courtyard. And once again Jaskier comes face to face with Geralt of fucking Rivia. 

“Jaskier, I am so sorry,” Geralt says, moving closer and Jaskier puts on his best-confused face. Oh, he’s sorry the bastard, is he now? Jaskier will make him apologise a thousand times more before he deems it acceptable.

“I’m sorry I think you’re mistaking me for someone else.”

“This is Julian of Kovir,” Eskel adds helpfully, “And Julian this is my brother, Geralt.” 

“Nice to meet you Geralt,” he says all cheerily. “I’ve heard a lot about you! Let's spar sometime, shall we?”

Geralt just blinks disbelievingly in response. 

Splendid! The first part of the plan went astonishingly well!

-

Geralt acts as scripted, and of course he does, Jaskier takes pride in having deciphered the man’s almost nonexistent expressions and little nuances in his movements. He knows how Geralt thinks and he knows that he did not believe for one bit that Julian is not Jaskier. 

So, every day for a whole week Geralt will stealthily follow Jaskier around the keep when he thinks Jaskier is not watching desperately trying to decipher the mystery around his existence. At some point, he’ll have enough and outright interrupt whatever Jaskier’s doing and he’ll apologise. Again and again and again. But it’s always going to be a simple ‘I’m sorry Jaskier’ and Jaskier will always shut him down with a chuckle and dismissal of his bardic identity.

He must pull a better apology from Geralt’s lips somehow. It is petty and he knows Geralt is trying really hard with his words and he respects that so fucking much but –damnit– he deserves a proper apology. 

So it’s time for the heavy weaponry to enter the game; namely his elven lute.

He makes the secret sign to Eskel when he sees him and waits for supper. 

They are through their second bowl of watery stew, or rather stew-y water, that Lambert expertly pulled together when Eskel gets up to get the lute. 

"Bring some bread while you're at it," Vesemir says uninterested. "It could use some taste," he gestures at the stew and Lambert gasps in fake shock.

"It is bland," Geralt affirms and Lambert shrieks a _ how dare you. _

"I think it's a lovely attempt," Jaskier smiles sympathetically, "but it could use some, I don't know, carrots? Onions? Potatoes?" He grins at Lambert.

"You. You are all insufferable, the lot of you, you pricks!" Lambert yells and the rest of the Witchers laugh. "I'd like to see you do it better!"

"Challenge accepted," Jaskier says, "I'll cook tomorrow. Prepare to be amazed, dear wolves!"

" _ Oh nooo! _ " Lambert says dramatically, "I don't want to get the runs. Someone stop that Griffin!"

"Prick. I'll have you know my cooking skills surpass those of the chef of the Temerian court!" Jaskier teases, though he knows damn well he's not as good as he claims to be. Better than Lambert, yes. But good? That's a hard no.

Ekel comes back at that moment half a loaf of bread in one hand and the lute in the other. Jaskier scans Geralt's expression, careful not to give away his curiosity. The white-haired Witcher is frozen in spot, his complexion whiter than his hair. 

"Is that a lute?" Vesemir raises a dark brow. 

"Yes," Eskel responds, takes it out of its case and strums the strings in the tone of The Fishmonger's Daughter. "Thought this place could use some livening up."

Geralt looks at the lute then at Jaskier and black at the lute and this goes on for the several long minutes Eskel makes an attempt to play the song as Jaskier taught him to (he's not bad for a first-timer).

"Where'd you get the lute?" Vesemir asks.

"Found it abandoned in a clearing," Eskel says nervously and Jaskier prays that Geralt won't see through the lie. 

“You don’t say the whole story, my friend,” Jaskier shakes his head in faux disappointment, “You see, we were hunting a Leshen in the woods near Cintra when we stumbled upon the clearing. It was evident some poor sod had chosen it as a camping spot, may he rest in peace--” he stops as a whine leaves Geralt’s throat.

Geralt's breath hitches as he looks between Jaskier and the lute. Until he reaches over the table and grabs the delicate elven lute from Eskel's hands. 

"It's Jaskier's," he says, his voice breaking and he’s clutching the lute too tight. Jaskier can smell the salt of tears in the air. 

_ Oh shit. Oh no _ . He went too far, didn't he?

"Geralt," he croaks, " fuck, Geralt, I'm sorry. I was so mad at you –fuck– I went too far and I– I" 

“You’re not cursed,” Geralt sighs in relief and puts a hand on Jaskier’s shoulder.

“Pardon?” Whatever did Geralt mean by ‘cursed’?

“You’re a Witcher. You are Jaskier and you are not cursed. You remember.”

“That… is all true,” he says hesitantly, “Fuck, Geralt, you thought I was cursed? I just wanted a proper apology for the mountain, that’s all,” he admits feeling ashamed.

“I’m sorry. For everything. I really am,” Geralt whispers, never breaking eye contact. “I was a terrible friend to you and I shouldn’t have said all the shit I’ve said.”

“Ugh,” Lambert groans rolling his eyes, “No one wants to hear you two whiny shits.”

“I accept your apology Geralt, and I’m sorry for tormenting you the past week even though you absolutely deserved most of it,” Jaskier settles for a shit-eating grin and frees his lute from Geralt’s clutches, who in turn punches him in the shoulder affectionately. He turns to face Lambert, “And Lambert…”

“What.”

“I wrote you a limerick. It goes like this: Lambert, Lambert what a prick.” he strums his lute for dramatic effect and that earns him a pack of wolves laughing at Lambert’s expense. 

The perfect way to end the night, don’t you think?


End file.
